The Pebble
by Summersetlights
Summary: He gives her the rock, placing it in her palm, to help her remember the night.


**_Disclaimer: I don't own Degrassi._**

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><p>It was a dream.<p>

She knew that it was. It was quite obvious in the way the waves stopped right at her feet, only getting her big toe wet. And it was obvious in the way the boy was sitting next to her, holding her warm and tingling hand.

Clare Edwards breathed the sea air, taking in the smell of salt and the smell of the hot dogs that the one man was selling at his stand. The air was crisp and cool and fresh.

"You do know that this is a dream, right?" The boy asked quietly, squinting his eyes into the far distance.

Clare glanced at him, noticing that there was a bit of saddness in his eyes, a saddness that she could identify with. "Yes." She whispers this and he glances at her and gives her hand a light squeeze.

She picks up a small pebble and examines it, tracing the indented lines and smooth surface. The stone fits perfectly in the palm of her hand and she kept it there, wrapping her fingers around it, and giving it a light squeeze. It would be a souvenir that she would not have in the morning.

"I do that." Eli says, his voice still distant, and looks closely at Clare's hand.

"Hmmm?" Her hum comes out a bit ragged, like a piece of broken glass that has edges sharper than a needle.

"The stone," Eli explains and motions towards her hand, "When I sleep at night. I keep one in the palm of my hand." He picks up his own stone and places it on the tip of his pointer finger, and it wobbles slightly, before deciding that it wanted to stay on his flesh.

Clare's eyebrows furrowed gently, and a slight crease made its way into the middle of her forehead. Her lips puckered in concentration and she watched him throw the grey stone in the air, and then swiftly catch it. "Why?"

He catches it one last time before he launches the pebble into the open water. The water rippled, creating small waves. Clare watched the ripples slowly fade out and watched the water become calm again.

"It calms me," Eli shrugs, picking up handful after handful of sand up and clumping it together, making a bigger mountain each time, "Bullfrog does it, too. It's odd, I know. But when you wake up in the morning and it's still wrapped in your hand, I don't know, it's just...I realize that not everything leaves and some things actually stay with you."

Clare nods her absently, making her soft curls bounce. She runs her small and nimble fingers in the sand, trying to find a pebble. Once she finds one, she places it lightly in her hand and takes a long look at it, trying to see what Eli sees in it. But all she sees is a rock.

"You get that from a rock?" Clare wonders out loud, thinking that maybe she's missing something. Or maybe she isn't smart enough to understand this.

"Yeah, I know, it sounds stupid, but-"

"No," Clare interrupts and rolls the stone between her pointer finger and thumb, "it actually sounds quite lovely."

He smirks and lets out a mocking snort, "Lovely?" And he tosses his head back to the sky, with a wide grin on his face, "you're an odd one, Edwards."

"At least I don't sleep with rocks." Clare snapped jokingly, making his neck jerk to face her.

"At least I sleep with something." Eli shoots back, a playful smirk on his face. He grabs a clump of dirt in his hand again and tosses it onto Clare's lap.

"Yeah, but you sleep with inanimate objects. That doesn't count, my friend." Clare giggles and throws the dirt back on Eli. And because this is a dream, Clare Edwards doesn't care that her pants are dirty.

"Fair enough." Eli shrugs and adds the clump of dirt on his lap onto the pile in front of him. His fingers fumble around in the sand around him and when he finally finds what he's looking for, he let's out a successful "Ah!". He has a small twig in his hand and he handles it carefully, afraid to break the small piece of wood.

"You wanna do the honors?" Eli asks and motions for Clare to open up her hand. She cautiously opens up her soft hand and is surprised when Eli drops the twig in her palm.

"Just what I always wanted!" She jokes, but still has no idea why she's holding it.

"Oh, Edwards, you're just hilarious. Really. You are," Eli softly grabs her wrist and slowly drags it to the pile of sand, "just stick it into the castle. It can be a flag."

"Castle? Looks more like a lump of nothing," Clare murmurs and sticks the twig in. And the small leaf on the end actually did make it look like a flag. A green flag, "all done!" She says proudly and grins at Eli.

"Not yet," Eli says, wagging her finger at Clare. She scowls and folds her arms tightly, "we need our names on here. So everybody knows that it's ours." And he uses his finger to write their names in the wet and grainy sand.

"Now it's done?" It looked done to her, but Eli shook his head.

"Not yet." He repeats for a second time, and because it's a dream, Clare doesn't get agitated. He swiftly grabs three stones from behind him and places one on the castle, right next to the wimpy and weak flag, and puts one in his hand and one in Clare's.

"What's with you and giving weird objects?" She giggles and holds the pebble tight in her hand, because even though she won't admit it, she wanted to keep the stone forever.

"It's for you to remember this." He says simply, gesturing around the beach, and stands up, causing Clare to panic and stand up, too.

"Wait! Why are you going?" Clare pleads, and once again, her voice is broken glass, scratching and clawing its way out of her throat, "please don't go."

But Eli turns on his heel and starts walking, his pace slow and easy to keep up with, but Clare just watches, her legs not able to move. "You'll wake up soon." He calls over his shoulder.

And as he fades into the distance, Clare feels like she is shooting backwards, because suddenly she finds herself in her bed. Her sheets are wrapped tightly around her and the back of her neck is sweating. She kicks the blankets off of her in frustration and she let out a large groan, throwing her arms down in anger. She wanted to cry, but just when a tear was about to slip out of her eye, she heard something rolling around on the wooden floor. Clare quickly turned on the light, and once her eyes get used to the brightness, she slips down on the ground, trying to find the source of the noise.

She stands up, empty handed, frustration seeping into her skin, and starts walking to her bed, when she steps on something hard. It sank its way into the heel of her foot and she gasped, looking down.

A...stone?

Clare bent down in confusion and picked it up, running her hands over each line. A small smile appeared on her lips, making her whole face light up in a way that it was almost as bright as the light next to her. Squeezing the stone in her hand, she walks the rest of the distance to her bed and slips underneath the covers, the pebble resting snuggly in the middle of her palm.

And she closed her eyes, letting sleep conquer her. But before she did, she hoped that the stone was still in her hand in the morning.

Because what dream-Eli said was true.

It's nice having something in your life that stays.

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><p><strong><em>What is this? I have no clue...sorry that it sucks horribly.<em>**

**_Oh, the stone thing isn't completely random, I do it. Haha. Weird, right?_**

**_Review, please? _**


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